Cameron Plans Crackdown on Strikes as One Million Public Workers Walk Out

by Editor | July 10, 2014 1:57 am

THE GUARDIAN – David Cameron has been accused by union leaders of being a “Bullingdon bully” after he vowed that the Conservative election manifesto would tighten the screw on strike laws in response to what he regards as Thursday’s illegitimate mass walkout of up to 1 million public-sector workers.

Cameron attacked the low turnout thresholds in union strike ballots and challenged the validity of mandates to take industrial action derived from ballots conducted more than a year ago in some cases.

The prime minister said: “I think the time has come for setting a threshold. It is time to legislate and it will be in the Conservative manifesto.”

In a sign of how the political battle may unfold, the education secretary,Michael Gove, will accuse the teaching unions of not standing up for education but for their pay and pensions.